1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicle-seat retracting apparatus in which a headrest is retracted and a seat back tilts relative to a seat cushion in order to perform switching from a seating state to a non-seating state.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various vehicle-seat retracting apparatuses have been proposed heretofore. For example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2004-8493 discloses a vehicle-seat retracting apparatus in which a seat back 92 of a rear seat 90 is tilted forward to be placed on a seat cushion 91, as shown in FIG. 7 In the rear seat 90, a headrest 94 is retracted in order to prevent the seat back 92 from interfering with a front seat 93 during tilting.
In a state in which the headrest 94 remains standing in a manner similar to that when a passenger sits on the rear seat 90, the leading end of the headrest 94 follows the path shown by a curve C1 while the seat with the seat back 92 tilts, and interferes with the front seat 93 in a diagonally shaded region D. Consequently, the seat back 92 cannot be folded. Therefore, in order to prevent the interference with the front seat 93, the seat back 92 is folded so that the leading end thereof follows the path shown by a curve C2 after the headrest 94 is retracted.
The curve C1 coincides with the path of the leading end of the headrest 94 made when the tilting angle of the seat back 92 is adjusted for the seated passenger. However, the rear seat 90 is, of course, not used in a state in which the seat back 92 is tilted forward to a degree such as to interfere with the front seat 93.
In the vehicle-seat retracting apparatus disclosed in the above publication, an operation of retracting the headrest and an operation of unlocking the tilting angle of the seat back with respect to the seat cushion are independent from each other, and need to be performed in predetermined procedures. If the operations are performed in a wrong manner, they must be performed again, and this is troublesome.